The memory board photos that adorn the opening credits looked too real to be Photoshopped. Sure enough, this is the genuine thing, a family affair built around the Basco Brothers, Philippines' answer to the 4 Marx Brothers. Duke’s (Dante Basco doing triple duty as star, writer, and director) one-take arrival …
A post-apocalyptic amalgamation of Tom Hanks’ greatest hits (notably Turner and Hooch and Cast Away) lies at the heart of this wake up call to climate change deniers. (Perhaps the non-believers in the crowd might finally face reality if the message comes cloaked in sci-fi trappings and with the Walter …
My appreciation of the films of Wes Anderson began curdling halfway through The Royal Tenenbaums. His star on the rise, Anderson began buying into his own press and from it emerged a style that, even with the best intentions, tended to engulf, rather than inform. What followed was children’s wallpaper …
Like most singles of his generation, Tim has a “problem”: he’s supposedly incapable of commitment. But he only uses this status to justify his lifestyle. After dates, he doesn’t return messages, preferring instead to swipe to the next woman, who will hopefully look like her profile photo as well. When …
We open on gadgets, effects, and a chase filmed in jiggly close-up that makes it impossible to discern what’s going on. The image eventually stabilizes which is more than can be said for an insufficient script that too often relies on CGI patchwork to draw attention to its lack of …
The definition of insanity is watching another sequel with “Kong” and/or “Godzilla” in its title and expecting different results. Godzilla vs. Kong is a risk-free retread of Jurassic proportions. Wanted: big-name actors with a track record. Little to no acting required. Huge payday. Oscar nominations not a must. That’s what …
Kiro Russo is the man with a movie camera who, like Dziga Vertov who came before him, whisks us on an exhilaratingly detailed journey through a city and its surroundings. With jeweler’s eye precision, a complex series of compressed telephoto images moves us from the general to the abstract. Slowly …
Sam (Karen Gellan) was barely a teenager when a shootout in a diner ended badly. Her mother, professional assassin Scarlet (Lena Headley), disappeared, leaving her daughter in the care of Nathan (Paul Giamatti), head of HR for a nebulous government organization known as The Firm. Fifteen years later, and Sam …
There was a time in the mid-’90s when it seemed like every other indie release owed a debt of originality to Quentin Tarantino. Hell, he produced half of them! The studio press release for Habit, the latest streetwise and cinema foolish grimefest starring Bella Thorne, pays its dues in the …
The scariest part of the film was the Miramax logo and the bad memories it stirred. What really kills? A director of David Gordon Green’s (George Washington, Snow Angels, Manglehorn) stature hitching his star to a formulaic “thing that refuses to die” comic book celebration of splatter. (That’s Green’s voice …
Oh, the perils of conformity. Tom (Joel McHale) and Janet (Kerry Bishé) have been happily married for fourteen years. Disgustingly so: the PDA-afflicted twosome can’t keep their hands off each other. At a friend’s annual cocktail party, the couple arrives separately and winds up having sex in the bathroom. It’s …
Set course for schmaltz when Billy Crystal puts his mind to dementia. They say inside every comedian is a serious dramatic performance bursting to get out. Lucille Ball (Stone Pillow), Jerry Lewis (The Jazz Singer), and Kevin James (Becky) all set out to prove their dramatic skill and instead rewarded …
Let the grand guignol begin as Ridley Scott goes to camp in his first feature since swapping out Gettys in the scandal-plagued All the Money in the World. Once again the focus is on a notorious clan piloted by a gaggle of pricey lookalikes. Offscreen, Scott’s a stitch, but the …